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SPEECH 



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MR, JOHN VAN DYKE, OF NEW JERSEY. 



DELIVERED IN THE 



HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE U. STATES. MARCH 4, 1850, 



SUBJECT OF SLAVERY, 



VINDICATION OF THE NORTH FROM THE CHARGES BROUGHT 
AGAINST IT BY THE SOUTH. 






WASHINGTON.: 

GIDEON AND CO., PRINTERS. 
1850. 







SPEECH 



The House being in Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union, and havino; under considera- 
tion the bill for the admission of California into the Union as a State, Mr. VAN DYKE rose and said — 

Mr. Chairman: I have but a single object in view in rising to address tiie committee at this time. 
It is not my intention to "agitate," particularly upon the "'peculiar institution" of the South, nor to 
■discuss at much length the great question which has recently been started here — whether slavery be 
or be not "a social, civil, political, and religious blessing." I leijve these matters to those whose 
whole souls seem to be entirely engrossed by them, on both sides, and who can neither see, hear, nor 
thinkof any thing else. Norshall I stop, in the short time allowed me, to calculate the value of the Union, 
as certain Southern gentlemen tell us they have done already, and who have proved very satisfactorily 
to themselves, I presume, by figures, which it is said cannot lie, that it is worth but little, and that they 
will be quite as well off out of it as in it. Nor shall I attempt to examine that other fjuestion, lately 
grown into immense importance here, viz , whether the impulsive, fiery, and chivalrous South, or the 
cold-blooded, phlegmatic, and calculating North, usually furnish the larger number of officers, and 
more and braver soldiers for that great test of human greatness, the field of slaughter. This subject 
has been rung in our ears until I have thought I heard the cannon roar, have imagined that I actually 
smelled gunpowder, and, in fact, saw something in tlfb papers about muskets and buckshot; but I 
leave this subject also to be settled by the "militia colonels" of Congress, and those who have never 
yet readied that important and dignified station. One thing is very certain, (and of this, I suppose, 
we are fully satisfied,) and that is, that we are all very brave when there is no danger. There is 
yet another subject much spoken of here — the scenes which are to follow a dissolution of the Union. 
The trumpet's clang, the clash of arms, and tlie sliock of battle — the tossing plumes, the prancing steeds, 
and the flashing steel — the wasted fields, the flaming cities, and the streams of blood — are paraded 
before us with all the "pomp and circumstance of glorious war;" but from such scenes I beg leave 
also to turn away. I cannot, with any degree of pleasure, contemplate the triumphs of Anarchy, as 
he waves his blood-stained sceptre over the broken fragments of this once happy and powerful Union. 
Nor do I believe for a moment that there is the slightest reason for any such contemplation. This 
Union was never stronger nor in less danger than at the ]ircsent time; and although we may have a 
little dispute among ourselvps, our attachments will be all the stronger when the storm shall have 
blown over and the quarrel shall have been adjusted. 

My object in rising, sir, is to vindicate the North, so far as I am able, against the gross and unjusti- 
fiable charges made against it, with little or no discrimination, by the South. Scarcely a Southern 
gentleman rises to speak upon this su'jjcct, but accuses the North, in the bitterest terms of reproach, 
of oppression, aggression, and outrage upon the rights of the South; and there is scarcely a news- 
])aper published on the southerly side of the line that does not assert the same thing. If the South is 
to be believed, the North, as a people and as States, are a set of Goths and Huns, Alarics and At- 
tilas — robbers, cut-throats, and constitution breakers, whose great object is to free the slaves, burn the 
dwellings, cut the throats of the masters, and dishonor the wives and daughters of the South. If, in- 
deed, the North be guilty of all these sins, both actual and intended, then to be sure we are greatly in 
the wrong, and our brethren of the South do not complain without cause. But, sir, I deny these 
charges utterly. It is not true that the North has been guilty of any aggressions upon the South. It 
is the mere creature of the imagination — "the baseless fabric of a vision." I hold myself ready to 
prove the position which I take; and I invite your attention, sir, and that of the committee, to those 
stubborn things called facts, to sustain me in what I say. 

I know very well that certain persons in the North have done and said particular things, not ap- 
proved of any where, well calculated to displease the South, and of which I shall speak more fully 



hereafter: but it is equally true that portions of the South have done tlie same thing; and while it is 
not my intention to charge the South with aggression upon tlie Norlii, yet I do affirm that the whole 
course of the legislation of the country, from its foundation, has been to suit the views of the South; 
and no law, whether for protection, improvement, or otherwise, that did not accord with the wishes 
of the South, has ever been allowed to pass, or, if passed, to remain long on the national statute-book. 
The complaints, the domination, or the superior abilities of the South, have always enabled it in the 
end to have its own way. 

Mr. Chairman, I am not precisely certain whether I should class the State from which I come 
among the Northern or Southern States. If that magic line, of which we hear so much, known as 
Mason and Dixon's line, should be run stiaighl through to the Atlantic, it will cut our State directly in 
two, leaving a part of it on each side of the line. And besides this, 1 find, on looking at the map, that 
the southerly part of the Slate of New Jersey is on the same parallel with the District of Columbia, 
M'hich, with that part of the Slate of Maryland lying north of it, claims, I believe, to be purely southern-, 
but whether it be southern, northern, or neither, one thing is pretty certain, that neither she nor any 
of her representatives are very fanatical on the subject of slavery. She does not countenance mere 
frantic agitators at home, nor does she desire that her Representatives should become such here ; but 
I am sure that 1 speak only the truth when I say, that anK)ng her whole people there is a deeply seated 
and abiding conviction on the subject of slavery. Having had the institution herself, and having 
gradually abolished it; havinir fully examined and t'ully tried both sides of the question, as our friends 
of the South have not, she does not believe that it is either a social, civil, political, or religious bless- 
ing, but she believes directly to the contrary; and she believes, further, that all legislation which may 
lawfully take |)lace on this subject should be to restrain, and not to extend, either its power or its area. 
As slie would resist, with all the eneru:y within her power, the re-establishment of slavery within her 
own borders, so she will never consent to its re-establishment in any territory of the country where 
it has been once abolished by law, and where it does not now exist. But, having used all the means 
within her power to frustrate any such attempt, if she shall find herself voted down by a majority in 
tiie National Congress, I think 1 may say for her that, whatever she may tliink, she will not attempt 
to dissolve the Union in consequence. 

But to return to the charges of aggression, which is the word commonly used to comprehend every 
kind of northern iniquity. In the great Southern Address of last winter, which was signed by most 
of the Southern members, occurs'the following passage; and I quote it because it is more temperate 
in its tone than usual, and because it bears the signatures of a majority of Southern members in both 
Houses of Congress. In speaking of what it terms a "conflict" between the two great sections of the 
Union, the Address continues: 

"The conflict commenced not lonir after the acknowledgment of our independence, and has gradu- 
ally increased until it has arrayed the great body of the North against the South on this most vital 
subject. In the progress of this conflict, aggression has followed aggression, and encroachment encroach- 
ment, until they have reached a point xcherc a regard for your peace and safety will not permit tis to remain 
longer silent.'''' 

This charge of aggi-ession, in some form or other, is iterated and reiterated by almost every gentle- 
man who speaks from a slaveholding State, and it is the only true ground, or pretence of ground, on 
which a dissolution of the Union is threatened; and yet no one has ilius far been able to lay his hantf 
upon or specify one single act or instance in all the North, which can be either seen, felt, or known, 
which can possibly justify or sustain this most unjust and slanderous charge. All is known by hear- 
say. One manufactures a story, others put it into circulation, until nearly worn out; it is then newly 
vamped up and recirculated, until, with the aid of a rather easy credulity, the Southern people come 
to believe it is actually true ; and having heard it told so often, they assert it with all miaguiary posi- 
tiveness, without ever thinking whether there be any evidence of its truth or not. 

But I have, without hesitation, denounced the whole string of charges, both in the aggregate and in 
detail, as being without foundation and untrue ; and although the burden of proving them true natu- 
rally rests on the I'larty who makes them, yet I am willing in this instance to reverse the usual order 
of evidence, and prove the direct contrary to be true. 

These charges of aggression are divided into four classes, viz: 

Aggressions by acts of Congress. 

Aggressions by State Legislatures in relation to fugitive slaves. 

Aggressions by State courts and State officers on the same subject; and 

Aggressions by the Norlhern people in aidiiio: the escape of slaves. 

And first, the aggressions by acts of Congress. I have already stated, sir, that the whole legislation of 
the country has been of a character to favor the South, and not encroach upon her. And now let us 
look at the facts. 

The Southern Address goes back for its aggressions to a lime prior to the adoption of tlie Constitu- 
tion. And to that period I propose to follow it. When the Constitution was adopted we had but 
thirteen States. Since that time seventeen new States have been admitted into the Union ; nine of 
tlicse have been admitted as slaves Slates, and eight of them as free States, .^s Congress, then, has 
thus far admitted more slave States into the Union than it lias free States ; and as these slave States 
could never have been admitted without the consent of the North, for the North has always had the 
majority in the House of Representatives; and as we have seldom heard of any resistance being made 
to such admission, we are bound to suppose that the North has not been very aggressive in this mat- 
ter, but directly the contrary. 



Again. Of the territory embracino; tlie present States of this Union, more than two-thirds of it is 
slave territory, and less than one-third of it is free territory. The number of square miles embraced 
in all the free States i.s 454,340 ; the number of square miles embraced in the .'ilave Stales is 936,-318. 
While the number of white inhabitants in the free Slates is much more than two to one over the slave 
States, yet tlie slave States, in extent of territory, have more than two to one over the free States; and 
as nine of these slave States have been admitted by Congress, which always Ivut control over the ques- 
tion of boundary; and as these States, thus extended, could never have been admitted but by the con- 
sent of the North, I do not think that it was very aggressive upon the South in this matter. 

Again. So anxious has the South ever been for the admission of new States from that section, with 
a view to |ireservc the equilibrium, as slie calls it; and .<-o willing has the North ever been to accommo- 
da'e her in this particular, that three of the Southern States iiave now only population enough to en- 
title them to one representative each. Whetlier they will ever have any more or not is anions the 
unknown things ; but no such thing exists in the North. The last three States that have been admit- 
ted from the North were kindly kept back from atl'ecting the equilibrium princifde, until they were 
entitled to two members each. And the very last one which has been admitted from the North, and 
admiited by the last Congress, has now three members on this floor. In this matter of Congressional 
action, then, it cannot be said that the North lias been very aggressive, but quite otherwise. 

As another evidence of the oppressive and aggressive disposition of the North, in 1803 it agreed to 
purchase and add to the country that mighty territory, known as the Louisiana purchase, lying on the 
west side of the Mississippi, and reaching from the southern point of Texas to the most northerly line 
of our possessions, and stretching westward in part to the Pacific ocean. This vast domain, every foot 
and inch of which was at the time covered, theoretically at least, and practically in part, by slavery, the 
North contribu'e(l its treasure to purchase, and gave it iq) to the uncontrolled dominion of slavery and 
the South for a period of nearly twenty years; and the moment the North began to hint that slavery 
had proceeded far enough, we heard threats of a dissolution of the Union. Out here again tlie South 
proposed its own terms; the North acceded to them, as usual, and all things went on smoothly. But 
let us pursue this subject a step further in search of Northern aggressions. Of the territory thus ac- 
quired tVom France four States have thus far been created — Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, and Iowa ; 
three of them slave States, and one of them a free State. And all this by the consent, agreement, and 
treasure of the North. Truly the North has been shockingly aggressive I 

But again. Out of the entire territory which we have acquired since the Louisiana purchase, ex- 
cluding the New Mexican territories, two States have been made, Florida and Texas, and both of them 
are slave States; and this, too, be it remembered was done with the consent of the North, and without 
whose aid no such acquisitions could have been made. FIvM'ida was acquired in 1319, and admitted 
as a State in 1845, while Texas was acquired and admitted in 1845. 

The gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Toombs) admits that the North behaved very well up to 1820. 
I feel very thankful, sir, for tiiis small favor in the way o^" admission, because it comes directly across 
the great Southern Address; but he falls into the usual strain of vituperation against her since that time. 
Now, sir, 1 beg leave to call the attention of our Southern friends very particularly to this business of 
the acquisition of Texas, which I have shown hap[iened long since 1820. I do so because it furnishes 
in itself a most extraordinary instance of Northern aggression upon the South. The gentleman from 
Maryland (Mr. McL.we) insists that the annexation of Texas was not a question ot Soulhern policy. 
He says it was a Dnnocralic measure. I know very well, sir, that during the Presidential cam- 
paign of 1844, " the re-annexatiou of Texas, and the whole of Oregon," were prominently di.splayed 
on the gaudy banners of the Democracy, to catch both the North and the South ; and I know, also, 
that throush the influence of a Southern President then present, through the power of the lash and 
caucus screws of the South, where the Democracy were strong, that enough of the Northme"!! to carry 
the measure were forced into it ; but every one knew, and every body knows, that the measure was »f 
Southern orij^'in; that its great and only object and result was to benefit the South; to strengthen its hands 
and give to it political power and influence, by adding to its section a slave territory larger in extent 
than the States of Maine, Verm uit, New Marnpsliire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New- 
York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois put together, and nearly large enough 
to embrace Michigan also— Texas having 325,520 square miles, and the other States mentioned, ex- 
clusive of Michigan, but 21)3,259. I also' know very well that the Southern men, with a few excep- 
tions, did not publicly avow ihat their object was, and the result would be, to strengthen slavery and 
the South. The moVc oiptivating, but talse and shallow, argument was, that if we did not take it 
England would get it, a thouu;ht which the more heedless of our people could not abide for a mmient. 
But suppose the^entlcman from Maryland (Mr. McLane)* be correct in his view; suppose the 
North did of its own free choice, ami witliout force or pressure, agree to obtain this vast country, and 
to surrender every foot of it to the S'luth, to strengthen its position, and enable it to propagate and per- 
petuate slavery, how then stands the case as to the question of Northern aggression ,= Is^not the case 
much stroiig(M ? Is not the North entitled to much more credit, as between her and the South, if she 
did this thing willina;ly, than if it were wrung from her by force. 

But you, men nf the South, who char:,'e agi^ression and outrage against the North, please to bear in 
mind still further, as wego along, that this samevaslan I valuable country of Texas was thus^given over 
to the South without one particle of set-olT or equivalent on the part of the North. The South very 
quietly and coolly takes and apju-opriaies the wliole of it to herself; and now, when, as a clear result of 
that annexation, throu^'h the war which grew out of it, wc have acmiired other territories, not worth a 
quarter as much as Te^xas, she claims to reu\in this lion's share of Texas undisturiied within her own 
clutches first, and then asks to divide the balance even witli us. Yes, sir, this wonderful and higliminded 



section of the country, known as the South, containin<j but little more than one-fourth of the entire 
white population of the Union, actually claims, and it is this very claim which we are now disputin": 
about, to appropriate to herself the whole of Texas first, and then demands, in tones of menace which 
smell of sulphur and bristle with bayonets, that she shall have half of the balance. And the refusal to 
accede to this extraordinary demand is pronounced " an impudent assumption on the part of the 
North." Yes, sir, this is the language of the gentleman from North Carolina, (Mr. Clingman;) but 
if there ever was impudence more unblushing, and eflVontery more brazen tlian any other, it is 
that put forth l)y the South in the claim to which I have referretl. 

But the South asks, she says, nothing but justice, and will take nothing less ; but where, pray, did 
she get those ideas of justice? Suppose, for a moinent, we throw all the territory together — for I repeat 
that there was in fnct but one acquisition. We annexed one portion, and we had to fight to maintain it; 
in the settlement of the fight there was additional territory added. This is the proper mode, if a fair di- 
vision of proj.erty i.s what she is after. Let us divide it, then; and if the South takes the whole of Texas 
and nothing more, I ask you, men of the South, in all fairness and honesty, if your share is not worth 
four times, at le:\st, as much as all the rest put together.' I ask you, gentlemen of Texas, would you 
exchange your State, that was once a nation of itself, for a half dozen Californias and New Mexicos? 
I receive no answer ; I know you would not. And again, I ask and demand an answer, if any one is 
prepared to give it. Is there a man on this floor from tiie South who would to-day agree, if the thing 
were possible, to surrender up Texas to freedom and to the North, and take in its stead the whole of 
the other territories put together.' Alas, sir, echo, witli her thumb to her nose answers "not exactly." 
And this is all the response that 1 get. In any event, then, and under any circumstances, the South 
has much the better part of the bargain, and with this she should be satisfied, and to this she must 
submit, sii lar as I am concerned, if her only alternative be, that we shall by law inflict slavery upon 
an unwilling people, and re-establish it in tenitories where it has long since been abolished, and where 
it does not now exist. This is wiiat Congress has never yet done, and has never before been called 
upon to do ; and I think I am clearly right in saying that it never can be yielded. I can do almost 
anything else to reconcile difficulties, real or imaginary; but not this. 

Mr. Chairman, I have not overlooked the fact that, in the resolutions annexing Texas, a trap was 
set, which perhaps caught some northern gulls, under the pretence that the portion of territory lying 
north of 36° 30' was to be. free. Yes, sir, such an idea was supposed to be contained in the resolu- 
tions, and the South are now laughing derisively at us for being so silly as to be causht by any such 
bait. The trutli is, that the part lying north of the line will never have inhabitants enough to make a 
State, and until it becomes a State it is not to be free: and, by the terms of the resolutions themselves, 
it is never to become a State until the balance of 'I'exas consents to it. When that consent will he 
given, you who are Yankees can probably giiess. But, in the mean time, the slave constitution and 
slave laws of Texas cover every foot and inch of the territory, and so will continue, until the South 
as well as Texas agrees to the contrary. 

Some one, I tliiiik it was a Senator from Alabama, has said that Ocfgojiwasan ofTsett against Texas, 
but certainly not more so than the rest of the wild territory lying north of the line of 36° 30'. Our 
title to Oregon was not acquired when we settled the boundary line between England and ourselves. 
Our title to Oregon was just as perfect when the Missouri compromise was adopted as it is now, and 
just as perfect as it was to any other territory. It was insisted on in our controversy with England on 
three different grounds — first, by discovery at an early day ; secondly, under the Louisiana purchase 
from France, in 1803 ; and thirdly, by release from Spain when she ceded Florida to us, in 1819 — all 
before the Missouri compromise. So that our ov/nership of Oregon was just as complete, and the" 
slavery question was just as much settled therein, at the time of that compromise, as in any other ter- 
ritory that we then possessed. The only question with EngLuid was, whether we should keep the 
whole c)r only a part. 

And now, sir, let us pursue this Oregon question a little fi^rtlier, by way of seeing what aggressions 
were committed by the North u[)iin the Soutli in the adjustment of tliat question. This, bear in mind, 
was northern'territory. If the whole of it should be procured, it would add strength to the North in 
the future admission of Stales. And although the "whole of Oregon" answered very well for a politi- 
cal campaign, and although in the inaugural address we were informed that our title to the icliole was 
" clear and unquestionable," and the North had reason 'o expect that our right to it would be main- 
tained very valiantly ; but all at once we were informed that a title perfectly clear was surrendered to 
the half of it, and the poor North had to content itself with the remainder. When our riirht to southern 
territory was in dispute, the nation was unceremoniously plunged into a foreign war to det'end an ex- 
treme and preposterous limit ; but when northern territory was the question, at the first growl of the 
British lion the South '•' caved in," and thouglit their " niggers" of more value than northern territory; 
the North soon followed, and we took the half of that to the whole of which we had, as we were told, 
a perfect right. This was clipping the wings of the .Yo?7/i. and les.sening its power; but to this the 
North consented, and yet the South accuses her of aggression. 

Mr. Chairman, the country, we are told, is nearly turned upside down on the subject of what is 
called the "Wilniot proviso." The people, it is said, are greatly excited on this subject; and some 
persons, I am told, are ex|)ecling every morning to wake u|i and find themselves dead. I know no- 
thing of this excitement among the pco|)le in my section of the country, and the reason probably is, that 
no pains have been taken to excite them. It may be otherwise in the South ; and why is it so? Not 
because the people have either seen or fel; any pressure upon them from any quarter, for there has 
been no such pressure; but the reason ('early is, that gentlemen from the South come here and make 
the most inflammatory speeches possible, in which they accuse tlic North of every thing that is bad. 



"\ 



and call upon their people, by every tiling that they hold dear, to arouse and resist the outrage and ag- 
gression. These speeches they circulate thick all over their districts, and the people hearing nothing 
else, and knowing no better, really imagine that there is something terrible ahead ; and thus the ex- 
citement of which we hear so much. But excited about what.' Why, the Wilmot Proviso. But the 
Wilmot Proviso has never yet passed Congress, and it is perfectly certain that it never will. Even if 
it should pass this House, it is well known that it cannot pass the Senate. And gentlemen here make 
threats of what they will do when the proviso passes, that almost make one's hair stand on end; 
threats which they know full well they are entirely safe in making, as it is very certain they will never 
be called on to put them in execution. But, then, we have talked about the proviso. Yes, we have 
talked much about it, and shall probably talk much more ; and we once passed it through this House. 
A year ago, when we had an extreme pressure upon us, growing out of the peculiar situation of Cali- 
fornia, to give her a territorial government, we did pass such a law, and we put the proviso in it. For 
this I voted, and I did so under a solemn sense of duly to that people. I had abundance of evidence 
before me, and I so firmly believed, that the people of California so desired it — a belief that has beea 
more than confirmed since, by the entire unanimity with which they have themselves excluded slavery 
from their limits by their constitution now before us. Satisfied as I was that such was the desire of 
that people, I should be unworthy of a seat in this House if I had voted otherwise. 

And here allow me to express my view of a representative's duly in such cases. It is not, in my 
judgment, the right or the duty of the representatives from Massachusetts, or any other northern State, 
to insist that the particular laws which suit them at home should be enacted in another and remote ter- 
ritory. Nor is it the right or the duly of the representatives from South Carolina, or any other south- 
ern State, to insist on any such thing in any such remote region. The question is not what kind of 
laws the North wants or the South wants in California. But the great question, under proper restric- 
tions, is, what kind of laws does the territory require and need. If a territory desire slavery within ita 
limits, and if it be a "great, social, civil, political, and religious blessing — a blessing to the slave and a 
blessing lo the master;" if it tend to make a country great and strong, and prosperous and happy; 
and if it tend to develop their resources, to increase enterprise and encourage industry and labor — then, 
if we think so, let them have it. But if, on the contrary, we believe it to be a great evil, a great moral 
wrong, a blight and a curse upon every country where it exists — if it hinder emigration, if it depress 
enterprise, if it discourage industry and labor, by making it disreputable for a while man to work — 
and, above all, if the people to be effected are deadly hostile to it, why, I ask, in the name of all that is 
just and reasonable, why should we either put it upon them or allow it to go there, if we can prevent 
it.' If it became necessary for us to give local laws to South Carolina or Massachusetts, it surely 
would be our duty to give them such laws as those Slates respectively desired and needed in their fiar- 
licular locations. And why is this not true when we are legislating for a Territory.' 

But, Mr. Chairman, I every day hear it asserted and repeated on this floor, that ihe Territories in 
question were acquired by the common treasure and the common blood of the Union, and that there- 
fore the people of all the States have an equal right to emigrate to these territories, and to carry with 
them their property of every description, and to be protected in it there. This is true to a certain ex- 
tent: but, judging from the course of argument on this subject, I infer that those who insist upon this, 
consider because we have all a kind of equal interest and partnership in the public properly, that there- 
fore each one has a right to march at once into the new territories with his horses, cattle, and negroes, 
clutch the first five hundred or a thousand acres that hoppen to suit him, squat down upon it, and 
claim it as his share of the plunder, with the right to hold it and work it with horses, oxen, or negroes, 
as he may think proper ; whereas, in truth and in fact, there is not one of us wlio is entitled to an acre 
of that land any more than an inhabitant of Kamschatka. It is true, we have all an interest in this pub- 
lic property, that is to say, we are the cestui que trusts; the Government is our trustee, and We arc enti- 
tled to have the proceeds of the sales, or other disposition of the property, justly appropriated for our 
joint benefit; but not one of us is entitled lawfully to have or touch a foot or inch of that land unless we 
buy it and pay for it, and take the Government deed as our title. This the inhabitant of Kamschatka 
can do just as well as we. We are not bound to do this : we can keep our money and purchase better 
land elsewhere, if we like. We stand in the same relation towards these Territories precisely as we do 
towards the other public lands of the^^atioh lying within or without the different Slates of the Union. 

But let us approach this subject a little closer. We have the same power to legislate for these Ter- 
ritories that the Legislatures of the different States have to legislate for their particular States. And is 
it true, that legislative power cannot restrain the people within its jurisdiction from holding and using 
certain kinds of property, and even t'rom pursuing certain kinds of business for a livelihood, if the 
holding and using of such property or the pursuit of such business be injurious to the public morals, 
or detrimental to the public good.' If there be no such power, what becomes of your laws to restrain 
piracy, counterfeiting, horseracing, gambling, mmselling, and the like, v/hich have been enacted a 
thousand times.' Have not the northern States repeatedly exercised this power in the abolition of 
slavery itself, wherein they have enacted that their citizens should not either hold or use slaves 
within their limits, and this, too, when a large portion of their citizens were slaveholders at the time 
of such enactments, and desired to remain so, and who protested loudly at the time against any such 
laws? Suppose, that in siving government to a Territory, we should insert a clause prohibiting pira- 
cy, counterfcitins:, gambling, and rumselling, as we have an undoubted right to do, would not every 
pirate, counterfeiter, gambler, and rumseller in the land cry cut that they had an equal right with 
others to this Territory, and that the Congress had passed a law which prohibited them from emigrating 
to these Territories, and carrying their property with them, and t»5ing it like the rest of the people of th,e 



8 

country? I suppose our southern friends are not willing to put slavery on the same footing with 
piracy, but many people think that it stands ahead of it. And, besides, the slave trade is already 
made piracy by law, and the difference between the two is not so very clear after all, as they always 
exist together, and ctinnot exist apart. When we had slavery in New Jersey, even in a modified 
form, we always liad slavedealers. Slavery cannot go into the new Territories without the slave 
trade going with it; and it is now one of the very grounds on which a dissolution of the Union is 
threatened, if we abohsh the slave trade between the States, a traffic daily carried on between them. 
If, then, we permit slavery to go into the new Territories, we must also send this ;>iratica! slave trade 
with it. 

But, gentlemen of the South, you have another difficulty in the way of carrying your property to 
the Territories which you say but little about, but you all kiiow full well tliat it is the real insuper- 
able obstacle in your way. It is this, with regard to property known as such the world over, you 
stand on the same footing witli the North precisely; but with regard to that thing which you call pro- 
perty, when speakmg on this subject, it is not property every where, like horses, cattle, &c. It is pro- 
perty nokvhere, except in particular places where the local law has made it property, and authorized 
man to hold it as such. Your slaves, which you call property in the South, are not property in the 
North, and you cannot hold them by law in the free States, if you take them there, as you can your 
horses. They are nol property any where under the v.-hole heavens, outside of your particular limits, 
if you once take them outside of them. They are not now property in any of the new Territories, 
because slavery has been abolished there, and it cannot exist, nor can slaves "be held there as property 
unless we re-establish it there. This is the great point in question. Gentlemen may talk around and 
evade the direct issue, but it comes to this at last. You want us to re-establish slavery, or at least in 
some way to recognise its existence in some part of these Territories which is now free from it; you 
want us, oy some affirmative act, to make property for you in the Territories; nothing else will satisfy 
you. What, but this is meant by your proposition to run the Missouri compromise line through to 
the Pacific? What but this is meant by all your oilers to divide it.' Suppose we continue the com- 
promise line through to the ocean, or any other line. What tl-.en.^ Nortii of the line is to be free, 
south of it is to be — what.' Free also.' Does the South want it for free territory.' No, sir. She 
wants it I'ur slave territory. And how is she to make it slave territory, the people there being oppos- 
ed to it, unless Congress itself shall, by positive legislation, re-establish it there .= This, I repeat, is 
the real question at issue. And as i have before saitl, this is forcing upon us a new precedent. It is a 
thing which Congress has never before done, and never even been called upon to do, and I am strongly 
inclined to think that it will ask to be excused from doing it now. 

If this be not the real question, pray tell us what the question i.s. " What's the cause of this com- 
motion, all the country through.-" The people are said to be excited; the South we are told are unit- 
ing like one man for defence. A great Southern convention is to be held. A Southern confederacy is 
being whispered. The Union is threatened, and even the day of its death has been fixeJ; and this 
very day revolvers and bowie knives were to be as plenty here as members. And I saw a lew Senators 
come into the Hall to witness the great catastrophe of final dissolution. I shall be glad, sir, if the 
Union be found existing in tlie morning; for if we can once get past the time fixed, we will probably 
be like the toUowers of father Miller, who, when they found that the explosion did not take place at 
the time appointed, began to think that after all it possibly might not take place just yet. 

But really, sir, what is there before Congress to produce the excitement, and to justify the speeches 
that are made here.' Nothing! Nothing but a simple bill for the admission of a Slate into the Union. 
But is there any thing necessarily exciting in this.' It is a thing we have done seventeen times before; 
and it is a. people, too, to whom we have refused a territorial government, and they now ask to come 
under our protection in another form; and gentlemen seem to be greatly excited about it. But slie has 
excluded slavery by her constitution. Well, we have admitted States in all ways, some with slavery 
in and soinc without it, and some that said nothing about it; but we have never yet refused a State 
because she either had it in or had it out. But to resist California for this reason, and to dissolve the 
Union on this ground, when the people there, according to the true southern State rights doctrine, have 
decided the matter for themselves, is a jiosition a little inore^nro-slavery than even our southern 
friends are willing to assume. And hence tliey say they do not resist her on that ground ; but they 
say that the President lias interfered in the matter, and that the irregularities and illegalities in her 
mode of organii;ation are so monstrous, and the persons who voted such vagabonds and vagrants, that 
the thing cannot be tolerated for a moment. Well, there seems to be some irregularities about it, I ad- 
mit^ but then we have no standard of regularity by wliich to be governed. The Constitution gives 
the power, but says nothing about 'the mode and manner of doing the thing. Thus far there has 
been scarcely two States that have been admitted in the same way. It is always a matter for the 
sound discretion of Congress. But the undersUtnding that I wish to have with our southern friends 
is, that if thoy refuse to admit California on the ground of bregnlurity alone, this being a question 
where a dilference of opinion should not make ill blood or ill friends, if there should happen to be a 
majority who think dift'eronily, and should vote accordingly to admit California — what I want our 
friends to promise is, that they will not dissolve the Union merely on account of this vTegiUarity. 

With regard to ihe remaining Territories, we have nothing before us concerning them, and 1 do not 
know that we shall have ; when it comes it will be time enough to meet it. Some weeks ago we had a 
resolution before us in favor of applying the scarecrow proviso to them; but as that was laid on the 
table by a large majority, and as the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Inge) insists that that proviso is 
dead, ami he having pronounced a funeral oration over it, I do not see what there is left for excitement 
and disunion to feed upon. 



But the gentleman from North Ctirolina (Mr. Venabll) says, we are trying to dishonor them; 
that this is a thing never attempted before, and I understood him to say, with great vehemence, that 
he woukl rallier die, i have forgotten how many deaths, than submit to dishonor; and 1 understood 
him also to say, that he v/ould far ratlier that all the little Venables in North Carolina should share 
the same fate, than that they should submit to dishonor. These are brave words, and they were 
bravely spoken. The gentleman also told us that there should be no skulking or dodging in this 
House, if he could help it. That every man should " face the music." And vet that gentleman but the 
day before, from midday till after midnight, did nothing else but shirk and dodge the question before 
the Hou.se. He was famous among the famed in calling the ayes and noes on every frivolous ques- 
tion that could be started lo avoid a direct vote on the pending question. Wliv, sir, I left tiie Hall for 
a few moments, and on returning found the Clerk calling the ayes and noes' I inquired au.xiously 
what the question was, and was informed that the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Venable) 
asked what — to face the music.' No, sir, he asked to be excused from voting; and tliis is what he calls 
"facing the music.'' 

Mr. Venable. Did not the gentleman, when the President sent in the constitution of California, 
vote against my proposition to refer the subjenl tg the Committee on Territories? Did he not vote for 
a reference of that subject to the Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union ? And did he not, 
a few days after, vote for the resolution of the member from Wisconsin (Mr. Doty) to take out that bill 
from the Committee of the Whole and refer it to the Committee on Territories, with peremptory in- 
structions to bring in a bill under the previous question.- It was this that I resisted, and the South 
resisted, by all the means which parliamentary rules afforded. 

Mr. Van Dyke. Mr. Chairman, I do not distinctly recollect all the votes that I have given on un- 
important subjects, but I do recollect very well a very important one that I gave. I voted to exaise 
the gentleman from North Carolina from voting, as I understood hn was urgent on the subject; and if 
I voted to refer the California matter to the Committee of the Whole instead of to the Committee on 
Territories, as moved by the gentleman from North Carolina, it was because that, in the latter com- 
mittee, it would certainly have been smothered, while in the former it was thrown open to debate, • 
and beyond the power of the previous question, the very thing which the gentleman seems- so much 
to desire. I did not at any time vote to take this matter again out of Committee of the Whole, and 
refer it to the Committee on Territories with peremptory instruction, and under the previous question, 
to bring in a bill admitting California as a State; and 1 know of no such vote having been taken. I 
did vote against laying on the table the resolution of the gentleman from Wisconsin, (Mr. Doty,) but 
I did not vote to sustain the previous question on that resolution which cut off debate. I voted also 
against all the "stave off" motions made on that eventful day, except tlie one to excuse my honorable 
friend from North Carolina; but 1 did not vote to continue that child's play long after the usual hour 
for adjournment. 

But, Mr. Chairman, what of all this.' What difference did it make what particular committee had ' 
charge of the California constitution.' It was, after all, the only thing before us on the subject of 
slavery and the Territories. And if the gentleman felt himself and his section dishonored, it must 
have been by the simple fact that we were talking about the admission of a State. And as the main 
ground of hostility to such admission is the question of hregularity, the gentleman cannot help but 
perceive that the dishonor, if any, must attach to those who vote to overlook this shocking irregularity, 
and not to those who vote against it: so that the gentleman and his friends, if they vote against this 
ii regularly got up constitution, will be entirely free from dishonor on that score. 

But, Mr. Chairman, I have been led somewhat fVom the main object of my remarlcs, whicli was to 
repel the charge of aggression made against the free States by the South. I have not done with the 
subject, but return to it again, as it is one which, in my judgment, the country at this time should fully 
understand. 

Anotlier cause of complaint and charge of aggression is the alleged interference of the North with 
the question of slavery in the District of Columbia. Sir, there has never been a doubt, in the North 
at least, that Congress had full power over the question here, at any time and in any way, to abolish 
both slavery and the slave trade; and it is equally true that the North has most of the time had the 
number of votes necessary to carry such measure through Congress, if it had seen fit to use them. 
And yet, sir, it is true, that with all this power of constitution and of numbers, the North has, down 
to this very hour, permitted in this District not only slavery, but the slave tradt — that infamous traffic, 
which the laws of nations and the laws of Ctnigress have long since made ])iracy, and punished with 
death, wlicii engaged in by persons of dilYerent nations. This infamous traffic, I say, in its most 
offensive forms, is down to the present Hour permitted to be carried on between the citizens of our own 
country and the States of the Union with perfect impunity here in the Metropolis of the nation, in 
sight of the Capitol, and beneath the fliig of the Union! Is this aggression, sir.- Wiiy if we had 
swept it away long ago, we could not have been accused of ciggression. Hut allow me to atk gentle- 
men of the South, why they insist upon the continuance of these things here? Why must the one 
hundred and seventy members of Congress coming from the North be forced to look upon tlje loath- 
some and repulsive scenes connected with this traffic? Why must ;he representatives and official per- 
sonages from every government on the tace of the eartli, and every stranger and traveller who visits 
our capital, be forced to look upon our slave pens, and droves of miserable half naked negroes, bound 
together, and driven along the streets like cattle or swine, to a railroad depot or steamboat landing, to 
be shipped to a Southern market? I feel almost degraded wlien I admit that the North has thus far 
tolerated and consented to all these outrages against humanity and decency ; and because we tolerated 
them, we are accused of aggression in this respect. And the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Stephevs) 



10 

told us at an early day in the session, and \dth much warmtli, that if we abolished slavery in the Dis- 
trict of Columbia, the day we did it we would dissolve the Union. But do not gentlemen stand greatly 
in their own li-'lit in this matter of the slave traffic, especially in the District? Would they not enjoy 
their own institutions in more peace and quiet at .home, where no sensible man desires to pursue them, 
if thev would at once r.gree to put it out of our sight? For myself I can only say, that before I came 
here 1 felt but little concern on the subject; but when I was forced to look, as 1 have done, upon a 
drove of negroes, of both sexes and of all conditions, bound together, and publicly <lriven along Penn- 
sylvania avenue amid the hootings and shouts of the boys, I confess that, although my nerves are not 
easily disturbed, yet this was a little more than I could look upon with composure ; and I doubt not it 
is 60 with others. I felt very much inclined to adopt the elegant but forcible lines of Cowper— 
" I would not have a slave to till my ground, 

To carry me, to fan me when I sleep, 

And tremble when I wake, for all the weaih 

That sinews bought and sold have ever earned." 

And now, a word or two on the subject of slavery in the District of Columbia. The gentleman 
from Maryland (Mr. McL.vne) says that he does not look upon slavery as a blessing exactly, but he 
looks upon it as a necessity. This may be true to some extent in certain places, but it is not true in re- 
''ard to this District. Nor is it true witli regard to the State of Maryland itself. There is no necessity 
for its existence in either place, more than there is New Jersey, which lies almost beside them, and 
where under circumstances similar to theirs, they terminated that necessity long ago. But 1 shall 
confine my remarks to the District. There is neither cotton, rice, nor sugar, nor even tobacco, so far 
as I h-ve seen, raised in the District ; nor is there any kind of labor earned on here in which it can 
be pretended that slave labor is essential. Indeed, the principal use to which slaves are here applied 
is for domestic servants, and to hire out for wages ; and there is no good reason, that I can see, why 
a ffradaal emancipation should not commence. But I am no fanatic on this subject. I would not 
vote to-dav, nor at any other time while I expect to have a seat in this House, for the immediate aboh- 
tioD of slavery in this District, although I would vote for a proper bill for the gradual abolition ot it. 
Any sudden change on the subject would be unwise and wrong; and besides this, it is not the way in 
which the Northern States themselves got rid of it. • ,• ■ 

But further, Mr. Chairman, on this subject of Northern aggressions, which are going to dissolve 
the Union. Since the adoption of our Constitution, out of the sixty-four years which will have 
elapsed on the 4tli of March, 1853, when Gen. Taylor's presidential term expires, the South will have 
had the President and the entire control of the Government fifty-two, and the North twelve. Now, 
sir I care nothin'' about the question of which section has had the most honors. The North does 
not comphin of it. She could liave prevented it. But when the South talks of aggressions on the 
part of the General Government, through its diilerenl departments, I desire to know what kind of ag- 
gressions they can be, when the North has for fiftv-two years out of sixty-four surrendered up to the 
South the whole control and management of the Government in all its branches? Not only have they 
had the Presidents, but through them the cabinets, the co.urts, the foreign ambassadors, and all the 
officers of every grade throughout the country. The shaping, the forming and modeling of the sys- 
tem, has been theirs. The putting the machine in motion, and establishing precedents, as well as the 
powerful Execu:ive influence o%-er even tlie legislative department of the country, has during all this 
time been with the South— sometimes having the President and Vice President both ; and all this, 
too, when the North could always have prevented it, as her electoral vote has always been the largest, 
but'she did not. And yet the North is accused of aggression upon the South. 

But still further, sir: since these very troubles, which now so disturb our peace, have been upon us; 
since the acquisition of these territories— the great and really only cau.se of our unhappy strife— the 
North, with a majority of fifty electoral votes over the South, and consequently with tnll power to 
prevent it, has gone and again elected a far Southern man, a large slaveholder ; and has again, through 
him, surrendered the whole powers of the Government into the hands and control of the Siuth for 
four'years more, and during which time these very questions must, in all probability, be settled. Thus 
placint' this whole question of difficulty beyond our cqjitrol, and placing our.selves almost entirely in 
the power of the South ; and yet, with all these facts Bfefore us, our ears are daily stunned with the 

charge of aggression. ^t , » i . v c . <► 

But, sir, let us come one step further down in search of these Northern aggressors. About the hrst ot 
December last, the two Houses of Congress met. The august branch at the other end of the Capitol, 
havinf throuo-h the Vice President all the necessary powers to make it otherwise, quietly liound itself 
up both body and soul, in all its organization, and rolled itself over leisurely into the arms of the South, 
where it has remained ever since, and which is in itself a northern aggression scarcely to be submitted 
to ■ while at this end of the Capitol, the Democratic party went into caucus, and selected for Speaker 
a Southern slaveholder, and wiili it T find no faidt. The Whig party, strong at the North, also went 
into caucus for the same purpose ; but before a selection was either made or spoken of, a portion of 
our oppressed and down-trodden friends of the South started the remarkably modest project of com- 
pelling the entire Whig party, in that informal and preliminary meeting, to pledge itself not to legis- 
late at all on the subject of slavery or the Territories, except to suit the South, or that they should have 
no organization at all. This sage proposition the party declined'to accede to just then ; and thereupon, 
our Southern friends, before referred to, withdrew in a body, and in this House labored for weeks to 
carry into execution their purpose of disorganization : and one of them publicly reiterated here, upon 
this floor, the same atrocious sentiment, that unless this House would first "give secnrily" tliat it 



11 

would not legislate adversely to the wishes of tiie South, that "discoid .should reign forever ;" and 
this disloyal and disorganizing sentiment was clapped, and stamped, and applauded, not by the entire 
South I am proud to say, but by every fanatical disunionist from that section of the country ; and if 
there had not been patriotism enough in the House to adopt the plurality rule, and thus tumble over- 
board the whole disorganizing gentry, they would, doubtless, have kept the House and the country at 
bay until this time. Well, sir, these patriotic Southern gentlemen, after a struggle of three weeks, suc- 
ceeded in defeating a Whig Speaker and a Whis: organization, and to that extent a Whig administra- 
tion. The Northern Whigs, particularly, were disappointed, mortified, and provoked ; but what did 
they do? Did they go to their Northern friends on the Democratic side of the House, and propose a 
Northern action to' sweep this offensive Southernisni from the House? No, sir, they submitted quietly. 
Well, what next? Why, our Democratic friends had a Northern candidate for Clerk, whom they 
were very anxious to elect, and to which they were clearly entitled as against their Southern Demo- 
crats, who then had the Speaker, and they came very near electing him; when, all at once, the 
Southern Democracy became too patriotic longer to sMsLiiij a Northern man, and over they went, 
several of them, and voted fora Southern man,' Whig though he was, and elected him ; not because 
they preferred a Whig, not because they were excessively attached to the individual, but because ha 
was a Southern man. And now it became the turn for the Democrats of the North to be provoked and 
outraged by their Southern friends, as they were. But what did they do? Did they go to their of- 
fended Northern brethren and propose a Northern organization for the balance of the olficers' No, 
sir, they quietly submitted to the outrage. Here, then, the South, with a little more than a third of 
the body, has, by its domination and noise, and by Lis infidelity to its friends, driven the North from 
its every position, has procured the two chief and only officers who can, by po.ssibility, have any in- 
fluence on the legislation on this suliject of slavery; and this, too, when the North had full power at 
any moment, if they would have drawn a sectional line, to have excluded the South altogether ; but 
yet they stood by and submitted to all this, simply because they would not draw a sectional line or form 
a sectional party. The North could have organized the House in an hour, but it preferred seemg all 
the officers of the House and all the organization, through its committees, surrendered up to the South, 
rather than seem in any way to encroach either upon their i ights or their feelings ; and yet we are con- 
tinually annoyed with the perpetual clamor about Northern aggressions. 

Having examined, and, as I think, answered the charges of aggression brought against the North, 
so far as the action of Congress and the General Government are concerned, I will examine briefly the 
charges of aggression brought against Northern Legislatures, when acting in behalf of their respective 
States. The charges are of two kinds — the adoption of anti-slavery resolutions, and their action on 
the subject of runaway slaves; beyond these two, there is no pretence of complaint. With regard to 
the first, the adoption by Northern Legislatures of the resolutions in question is, as every one knows, 
but the mere expression of an opinion by those bodies, which have no binding effect upon any one. 
They have no force in themselves ; they cannot, and do not, affect the question of slavery in any sense; 
and even though these opinions be expre.ssed in intemperate language, yet it is their undoubted right 
to do so ; and although the South may not he pleased with them, yet it furnishes no ground of com- 
plaint. Certainly, it is no aggression ; and, besides this, it is the very course pursued by the Legisla- 
tures of the South— the only difference being, that tho.se from the South take the other side of the 
question. It was but the other day that resolutions on the subject of slavery from the Legislature 
of Vermont were offered in the Senate, and indignantly refused admittance ; but a few days after, reso- 
lutions from the Legislature of North CarolinaVere offered on the same subject, but of course on the 
other side of the question, and in which the J^'orlli, without distinction, was accused of ''fatiaticism 
andpoliticcd dishonesty:^'' but these resolutions were received with but two dissenting voices. 

And now with regard to the second class of legislative aggressions, viz., their action on the subject 
of runaway slaves. Although the Constitution of the United States nowhere contains the word slave 
or slavery, yet it does contain the following clause : 

" No person held to service or labor in one State under the laws thereof, e.scaping into another, shall, 
in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be 
delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due." 

This clause, although it does not say slaves, it has always been understood was intended to appljr 
directly to them, and is certainly broad enough to cover them. It will be perceived, however, that it 
only confers the right of capture on the master, but does not prescribe the mode and manner of car- 
rying it out. Well, sir, on the 12th of February, 1793, the States then being nearly all slave States, 
and die South having every thing pretty much their own way, the Congress of the nation passed an 
act in aid of this constitutional provision, in which is laid down and prescribed the particular manner 
and through what officers such runaways were to be claimed and given up. The same act goes fur- 
ther, and inflicts a penalty of five hundred dollars upon any person who shall either rescue such fugi- 
tive, or harbor or conceal him after notice that he is such. In further aid of this constitutional 
provision, and of this act of Congress, the Legislatures of most, if not ali, the States, at the instance 
of the slaveholding States, for no others desired it, jias-sed, years ago, additional laws on this subject, 
to reeulatc the mode of capture and surrender; but in January, 1842, the Supreme Court of the United 
States, in the celebrated case of Prigg vs. the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, where the right and 
power of a State Legislature to pass any law on this subject was brought directly before the court, 
and for the express^'purpose of obtaining its opinion thereon ; the court, after elaborate argument 
and great examination, decided the law to be unconstitutional and utterly void. It took the broad 
ground that this being a constitutional provision, it was a matter for the General Government alone to 



12 

;arry out, and that neither tlie State Legislatures nor the State officers, as such, had any rig^ht to in- 
erfere in the matter at ail, and that all sucli laws were mere nullities. Under this sweeping decision, 
tnd in obedience to it3 high and undoubted autliority, the Legislatures of most of the Northern Stales 
epealed the laws which liieyhad enacted on the subject, and some of them prohibited the interference 
)f their o(Hcers. This, sir, is the whole of it, and nothing more. The Northern States, after having 
)assed laws to aid their slaveholding brethren, found those laws suddenly stricken down and swept 
iway by a decision of the Supreme Court. They snnply abandoned them, and siaiid precisely where 
hey stood before they enacted them. This was not their fault, because it was that wiiich they could 
lot avoid. And yet they are denounced as aggressors. 

Again : the Southern Address charges our Northern cojiWs with obstructing them in reclaiming their 
ugitive slaves. This charge, like most of the others, is made without any one being able to furnish 
L single examj)le to prove it. I know of no such thing, and have never heard of an instance; but I 
lo know of an instance, within tjie last six or eight years in the State of New Jersey, where a claim 
vas made to a .sUive. The rase was tried by a jury, which found in favor of the master, and the slave 
vas surrendered. And within the last five years a suit was brought by slaveholders, in the State of 
Michigan — a very Free-soil region — against persons charged with aiding and abetting the escape of 
laves; and a jury of Michigan gave a verdict in favor of the slaveholders, and against their ov/n Free- 
oil people, of about nineteen hundred dollars ; and in the case of Prigg vs. Pennsylvania, it appears 
hat he had the warrant of a Pennsylvania officer, by which he carried a woman and children out of 
hatState into Maryland without interruption. So much, then, for aggressions by the Northern courts- 
Bin it is s;iid, ag«in, that the South is obstructed in recovering their slaves by mobs. Well, sir, 
omeof the peojile of the North, as well as the South, sometimes misbehave themselves. We some- 
imes have mobs and riots, but there is no one thing that has caused as many in the North as the 
ttempts lo break up abolition meetings and to put down abolitionists. But the Northern mobs are 
eldom composed of the public authorities, as was the one in South Carolina, which drove a respcct- 
ble citizen of Massachusetts out of that State, because he simply desired to appeal to iheir own 
ourts in behalf of an imprisoned citizen of the latter Stale, which the former had confined. There 
3 doubtless some cause of complaint on both sides. A few in the Norlh refuse to aid in the surrender 
f Southern slaves, while some in the South refuse to surrender Northern freemen. Persons in the 
^orth publish abolition papers, and persons in the South rob the mails in search of them. Slave 
egroes, having brains as well as legs, run away from the. South; and Southern men Icidnap the free 
egroes of the North. Tiiese arc all evils incident to society, v>'hich laws may punish, but cannot 
revent; and which will remain, to some extent, until man every where becomes perfect. 
But where, I ask, do these complaints about runaway slaves come from ? The gentleman from North 
larolina (Mr. Clis^gman) told us that the little Stale of Delaware had lost §100,000 worth of slaves in 
le space of a year. I am bound to suppose that the gentleman had good authority fortius marvellous 
lory; but it seems to me that, if it were true, Delaware would be found complaining ; but she says 
ot one word. Perhaps she thinks, like other slave States should think, that the more she loses the 
etter she is off. Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri are the only other States ihat can well 
)se slaves in this way — they being frontier Slates; and yet, with the exception of Virginia, we hear 
ut little complaint from them on this subject. But it is North and South Carolina, Georgia, .-\la- 
ama, and Mississippi, that have never at any lime lost a slave in this way, that are making all the 
oise on this subject. But where are the slaves all gone to.' They are not to be found in Canada, 
lai great supposed gathering place; nor are they to be found in the free States, nor atiy where else, 
'he conclusion must be, that ihey have not run away; and why should they, if they are so exceed- 
igly happy at home, as gentlemen tell us they are.' And let me ask again, why this particular griev- 
ice has just ijeen discovered since the acquisition of the Mexican territories.' The law of 1793 has 
imained luialtered on the statute-book to the present time, and has been deemed satisfactory, while 
real attempt even has ever been made to alter it. 

Mr. Chairman, I fear that I see the cause of all these complaints and charges somewhere else. I 
Dard tell of a shrewd beggar, who always asked for several things in the hope of getting one. And 
it not true, and is not this the real secret, that our .Southern friends arc determined lo have a portion 
'the free territories obtained from Mexico as an additional slave markit ; and is it not true that they 
ive been trumping up this long list of imaginary grievances against us, with a view to hammer them 
i'er our dull and stupid brains, until, lo escape from the severe and incessant inlliction, we will finally 
ield the one point and allow them their market.' But, gentlemen of the South, if you have made up 
our minds to dissolve the Union on this point, you must undertake it; for I again repeat it, that you 
e asking too much. But, says the gentleman from Mississippi, (Mr. Brown,) we liave made up 
ir minds to have our right in these Territories. We will get it by our votes here if we can, but if 
e cannot, we will take it by "armed occupation." Well, sir, it might be interesiing to a man of a 
larlial spirit lo sec all the warriors that Mississippi can furnish, witli all her " militia colors" at iheir 
sad, sailing around Cape Horn, or taking the overland route, after Calilbrnia shall have been admit- 
d as a State, with a view of taking armed possession of that part of her which lies south of SG*-* 30'. 
might be interesting, I say, tr) a man of strong nerve, but not to me, lo see that army, after it had 
!en pifity well famished by feeding on Hour at fifty dollars per barrel, beef at a dollar a pound, and 
lUiloes at two shillings a piece — to see it, sir, under such circumstances, when a hundred thousand 
med warriors, such as California can furnish at the tiip of the drum, of the bravest and most despe- 
te men in the world, should, with carbines, rifles, bowie knives, and pistols, make a dcsC(.MU upon it. 
ir, I will not pursue this j)reposterous assumption. California alone, unaided by this Govornmenl, 
m repel and [irotect hers;lf agaiost any force which the combined efforts of southern disunionists can 



13 

send njrainst her ; and if Mississippi has any extra funds to carry on such ;i fruitless war, I would 
respectfully advise her to pay her debts witii it, or at least to commence the payment of iier long de- 
layed interest. 

Another cause of complaint is, and it is made a ground of resistance to the admission of California, 
that it will aestroy the equilibrium of the Government; that is to say, it is insisted that there should 
always be just as many slave States as free ones, which will make them ecpial in the Senate at least. 
But the Constitution contem|)lates no such thing, for it did not consider that any such division as 
North and South would ever exist; but this ])osition would forever prevent us from changing the 
number of States from an even number to an odd one. And this, after all, is a new idea started by 
the South; for, in former days, when the States were nearly all slave States, and when the few north- 
ern States that first abolished slavery were in a sad minority as against the South, and that section 
had every thing its own way, we heard nothing about equilibrium then. Rut I, for one, care nothing 
about this question of equilibrium. I do not wish the North to be considered as occupying a position 
of mastery 'over the South. We ate none of us masters in this sense. We are nil sove reikis, to he 
sure ; but then we are all equals notwithstanding, as .■sovereigns generally are. And when a State pre- 
sents herself for admission from a slave section of the country with shivery in her constitution, I sec 
no reason why we should refu.se to admit her on this account, if lier action be sufficiently regular in 
other respects. This we have often done heretofore, and ought to do it again if neces.^ary, for it in- 
volves no part of the groat principle now at issue. 

But the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Ven.^blf.) says that the South parted with its birth- 
right for a mess of pottage when Virginia ceded to the Government, for the purposes of freedom, the 
Northwest Territory; and she has been weeping, like Esau, for the lust fifty years, over that which 
she cou'd not reclaim. Great praise is claimed (or Virginia for this generous and munificent donation. 
But allow me, in the first place, to say, that Virginia (,lid not ni:tke the cession of that countrv. Vir- 
ginia did not own it. Her charter no more covers it than it covers California and Oregon. Virginia 
claimed a ])art of it, to be sure, and so did New York and Massachusetts and Connecticut, whose 
charters gave them about as good a claim to it as Virginia, and it required each of these States to make 
a release to the General Government of their respective rights therein before the title of the Govern- 
ment thereto became perfect. Virginia was not the first, even, to make the cession, for Nev.' York 
was in advance of ]ier in this thing just three years. The cession of New York was March 1, 1781 ; 
that of Virginia was March ], 1784. 

Again, the cessions on the part of the diflerent States had no reference whatever to the question of 
slavery or freedom at the time they were made. At that time there were other States, besides the 
four which I have mentioned, having, or claiming to have, wild and waste lands. Georgia and the 
Carolinas, and they all, agreed to cede, and they did cede, these lands to the General Government, for 
the purpose (and it is so recited in the instruments of cession) of enabling the Government to pay its 
debts, entirely regardless of the question of slavery ; and it was not until three years after the cession 
by Virginia, viz., in 1787, that the Congress of the old confederacy undertook to pass, anrl did pass, a 
general ordinance for the government of that Territory. In that ordinance is found the section con- 
taining the great anti-slavery proviso, now called the Wilmot Proviso, which, in terms, prohibits the 
existence of slavery in that great Territory, then a howling wilderness. This section was introduced 
by Mr. Jefierson, a Virginian ; and when it pas.sed, in 1787, it received the unanimous vote of every 
southern man in Congress. There were but two dissenters, and they were from the North. At that 
time there was no dispute about the blessings of slavery ; at that time all men held it to be a gre^t 
evil and a sjreat wrong, and the only question of trouble was, how they were to get clear of it. The 
South denounced it with much more bitterness than the North : her clergymen preached against it as 
a sin ; her statesmen spoke against it every where ; and all united in heaping curses upon our greedy 
British ancestors for inflicting it upon us. But now it is ]ironounced a blessing. No one dares speak 
against it in llie South at the peril of his safety ; and the southern politicians are now struggling with the 
utmost desperation to inflict upon our possessions beyond the Rocky mountains the same evil for 
which they have, with bitterness and anguish, a thousand times cur.sed their British ancestors for in- 
flicting on them. 

Mr. Chairman, the clock admonishes me that I have time to say but little more. It has not been 
my intention, nor is it now, to bring party politics into these remarks; but our friends on the other 
side of the House cannot, in their speeches on this subject, avoid as.sailing the present Administration 
and comparing it with its predecessor. Sir, if I, or the party with whom I act, had been instrumental 
in bringing upon the country the evils which now beset us, and which, although they will not destroy 
the Union, so greatly disturb and convulse it, I should scarcely venture to raise my voice in this Hall. 
You, who recklessly annexed Texas, and plunged the nation' into war, must bear the accumulated 
curses of a distracted and ruined people, if a dissolution in fact or in feeling shall follow our ill-omen- 
ed conflict. My hands, and the Jiands of those with whom I have acted in the matter, are free from the 
stains of blood'. Yours are not. The l(ones of lhou.sands of our slaughtered countrymen that lie 
mouldering in the sands of Mexico, and the sighs and tears of thousands of other bereaved ones, snust 
tell you in startling accents that you are the cause of all. And all the blood and tears and woe that 
shall proceed from fraternal conflict, if our idolized country is to be drenched in fraternal gore, must 
tell you the same thing. Without these Territories we could not have had any difficulty. 

The gentleman from Alabama, (Mr. Inge,) who, in Ins eftorts to make the great, the •ood,and 
brave old General, who at present presides over the destinies of this Republic, a fit subject for the luna- 
tic asylum, undertook to tell us that his idol, Mr. Polk, went out of ofTice in a greater blaze of glory 
than he came in. Perhaps so, but I do not see by wluU kind of logic he arrives at that conclusion, 



14 



when Mr. Polk came into office with a majority of about sixty in his favor on this floor, and went 
out with a positive and clear majority against him, and was the only President that we ever had that 
did not get even the ofTer of a reiiomination. But I cannot be tempted into any comments upon Mr. 
Polk. But with regard to Old Rough and Ready, he has often before been placed in circumsUinces of 
more appalling difficulties than those which now beset him, and he has not only always extricated 
himself, but those also who were entrusted to his charge, and he will do it again. He, who has never 
yet submitted to defeat, in whose vocabulary the word surrender is not to be found; he, whose very 
presence could make the thin but daring ranks of raw recruits a perfect wall of fire, over or around or 
through which the dark and dense array of Mexican awalry could not ride ; he, I say, will yet deliver us, 
if delivery we shall need. That brave heart, and that strong arm, and tliat indomitable will, if God shall 
spare his life, will for years to come, bear aloft the gorgeous ensign of the Republic with its stripes un- 
tarnished and its stars undimmed; or if fall it must while his hand grasps it, it will be but to make his 
winding sheet. And when the history of all those who now attempt to traduce the character of Gen. 
Taylor shall be forgotten and swept away among the cobwebs of. the past, his name will live in me- 
mory, in history and in song, a beacon light to guide the American youth up the steeps of fame, and 
conduct him to the gates of glory. 

" As some tall clifT that lifts its awful form, 
Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, 
Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, 
Eternal sunshine settles on its head." 



lil 



011 898 421 3 



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HOLUNGER 
pH 8.5 

MILL RUN F3-1543 



